At various points this season, I've grumbled on Twitter about bad Wolves losses costing people their jobs or cementing their place outside the postseason. And at other times I've wondered if they were starting to gel.
Their most recent game, a 108-101 win over the Clippers, left me wanting to get out of the prediction game altogether.
All of those peaks and valleys have left the Wolves on level ground: 32-32, with a huge variety in final outcomes for the season based on how those last 18 games finish up.
To me, there are four distinct quadrants in which the Wolves can finish: Top-6 in the West, which was a goal at the start of the year; 7th or 8th, which would give the Wolves two shots at a winner-take-all game in the play-in round to make the playoffs; 9th or 10th, which would be in the play-in but would require two wins in two games; or 11th and below, which would be out of the postseason entirely.
Chris Hine and I talked about the possibilities on Thursday's Daily Delivery podcast.
Let's dive into the four options:
Get a top-6 seed: Even if we accept that the Kings (No. 3 seed, 4.5 games ahead of the Wolves) and Suns (No. 4 seed, 2.5 games ahead of Wolves, ascending with Kevin Durant) are probably not within reach, there is still hope. The No. 8 Wolves are just a game behind No. 5 Golden State and the No. 6 Clippers, and just a half-game behind No. 7 Dallas. Minnesota holds the tiebreaker edge over both the Clippers and Mavericks, too.
But it would require more consistency than the Wolves have shown so far, and Basketball Reference only gives them about a 19% chance of getting a top-6 seed at this point. Given that this was a realistic goal at the start of the year, that's disappointing.
Finish No. 7 or No. 8: The Wolves finished seventh last season, won a play-in game and played a competitive six-game series against Memphis. Getting one of the first two play-in seeds increases margin for error with two play-in chances, and given that the Wolves are currently No. 8 — albeit by just a half-game over the No. 9/10 Jazz and Pelicans — finishing in one of these spots is very doable. Basketball Reference says it's about a 25% chance the Wolves finish No. 7 or 8, the outcome Hine predicted and one I think the Wolves would take at this point.
Finish No. 9 or No. 10: This would still give them a chance, albeit a lesser one, given that it would require two play-in wins (at least one of which would be on the road). This is also tied for the most likely outcome, per Basketball Reference, at 28%.
Finish 11th or lower: The Lakers (30-33) loom in the No. 11 spot, just 1.5 games behind the Wolves. The Blazers and Thunder are also within striking distance if they get hot. That makes Friday's game between the Wolves and Lakers — who will be without LeBron James — huge. If the Wolves win, they would clinch the season series against the Lakers and put 2.5 games between them, solidifying at least a top-10 spot. But a Wolves loss would close the gap to a half-game between the teams and set up a rubber match for the season series later this season at Target Center.
Finishing this low would put the Wolves out of the playoffs entirely and into the lottery — where they owe Utah their unprotected 2023 draft pick. Basketball Reference says there's a 28% chance of this happening.
Conclusion: Given that all four outcomes are realistic, it's hard to say what will happen. But we do know this: You (and I) will probably change opinions about it multiple times along the way.
